


What was he doing in your pajamas?

by eaten_by_bears



Category: Transformers Generation One
Genre: Age Difference, Age Play, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fluff, M/M, Storytelling, Toys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-21
Updated: 2013-02-21
Packaged: 2017-12-03 04:12:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/693970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eaten_by_bears/pseuds/eaten_by_bears
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I ever tell you 'bout the time I shot an Ick Yak in my pajamas?</p><p>Kup tells a story and introduces Grimlock to a new toy. Thanks to Minibotlove for beta, and to Caiusmajor for the idea.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What was he doing in your pajamas?

Kup smiled when he saw Grimlock nosing around outside the security center, looking a little bit aimless. He was in dino-mode as usual, head and shoulders taller than Kup, but with that young, puppy-lizard face he found so endearing. A kind of softness underneath all the teeth.

“Hey there, buddy.” Kup moved closer to him and put a hand on his shoulder. “How’s it goin’?”

“What you Kup want?” he asked, stomping around to face him but not pulling away from his hand.

Kup grinned up at him. “I was wondering if you had an astrosec to come see somethin’.”

Grimlock tilted his head, optics narrowed just a little in contemplation. “What kind thing you want show?”

Kup nudged him with his elbow. “The kinda thing you gotta see.”

“Hmph.” Grimlock looked around, as though checking for anything that required his immediate attention as King of the Dinobots. “All right.” He nodded decisively. “You Kup show me Grimlock this thing.”

“Good lad.” Kup clapped him on the arm and led him down the hall.

“Where we go?”

“My place.” He looked up at the bigger mech. “That all right?”

“Me Grimlock go to you Kup’s quarters before.” He tossed his head. Kup laid an arm over his back, and Grimlock allowed it. It wasn’t a common sight. The Dinobots weren’t built for embraces so much as for clumsy nuzzling, and hardly anyone else wanted to touch them in the first place. Kup was getting the hang of it, though. It just took practice.

He opened the door to his quarters. Now that he’d been on Earth a few months, the room was starting to look like someone lived in it. The metal desk built into the wall was getting untidy, covered with data pads and a couple of macaroni pictures from the younger bots. Or they may have been manicotti pictures; he wasn’t an expert on the scale of Earth pasta.

Opposite the desk was a low berth, bracketed by the wall on one side and a storage locker on the other. It was freshly welded from Earth-made steel, the same as most of the accommodations for the new crew. He liked it a damned sight better than the flimsy hammock he’d slept in when they first arrived, and better still than the holes he’d had to bed down in back on Cybertron. There was a stack of large blankets folded at its foot on top of the standard issue bedding, blue and gray, whatever he could requisition, ready for anyone bigger who might spend the night. Next to the berth was a big armchair, old and soft. It had used to be in the rec room until they’d gotten a new one, and it was well-used in a comfortable way.

The walls themselves were the dark gray of unpainted metal. He’d pulled a few strings to get one of the rooms at the rear of the ship where it wasn’t the ubiquitous orange. There were metal shavings around the sturdy hooks bolted into the ceiling, showing that they were a recent addition. Like most of the Ark, it hadn’t been built for a mech as big as Grimlock, but the ceiling was high enough that he could at least stand upright.

“Watch your tail, there,” Kup said, gently pushing Grimlock out of the way of the door. He always felt a little glow of pride when he didn’t get parts bitten off of him for stunts like that.

“Me tail stronger than dumb little door,” he said, but he followed Kup when he moved him, staying close by. “What you Kup want show me Grimlock?” he asked, nudging his shoulder, impatient to see.

“Oh, yeah.” Kup made his way to the tall locker. After a little rummaging, he took out a large gray ring, about the size of a car tire. It was open in the middle, the band of material about as thick as would fit in his hand and covered in a firm, spongy polymer. He held it out to Grimlock with an encouraging smile.

“What this thing?” Grimlock asked, picking it up to get a better look.

“You bite it,” Kup said.

Grimlock tilted his head, one hand on his hip. “What for?”

“’Cause it feels good,” Kup said.

“Huh.” He leaned in closer, squinting at it as though he were trying to read it. “Me Grimlock bite lots of things ’cause feel good.”

“Yeah, but this one’s special. You’re _supposed_ to bite it, and it don’t break when you do. Or it shouldn’t, anyway. Try it out.” He was amused by the questions, and glad he took an interest in the thing. He’d half expected he’d dismiss it out of hand the first few times he exposed him to it. Grimlock’s openness surprised him sometimes, after all his posturing.

Grimlock brought the ring to his mouth and bit down. The coating deformed around his fangs, but didn’t tear. He bit down harder, shaking it from side to side, but it held up.

Kup’s face softened as he watched him. There was something in watching a young bot trying a new thing for the first time - that hesitancy, the slight confusion. He never got tired of it. “How’s it feel?”

Grimlock took the ring out of his mouth and looked at it. It didn’t show any signs of his rough handling except for a little bit of oral fluid. “It feel funny,” he said, but he put it back in his mouth and started biting down on it again.

Kup took it as a good sign that he liked it enough to keep at it. “I figured choppers like yours’d make short work of a pacifier, but there’s no reason you can’t use a chew toy.”

“What this pacifier?” Grimlock asked. He only took the ring partway out of his mouth, so the words came out a little muffled.

“You suck on it,” Kup said, smiling. “That is, if you’re built for sucking. Here, I think...” He took one from subspace and held it out, a little blue plastic thing. Grimlock eyed it curiously. It was definitely too small for him, and too flimsy for his denta. “You give it to a little bot for a while, and it settles ’em right down.”

“Hmph,” Grimlock snorted. “Little pacifier only good for little Autobot teeth. No good for big, tough Dinobot.”

Kup reached up to touch his shoulder. “That’s right, baby. You’re special.” He rubbed the Dinobot’s plating with a gentle hand. A couple weeks ago, this might have gotten him a spurt of fire breath in the face, but now Grimlock allowed it. He even bent down a little to let Kup pet him. Kup tucked the more conventional pacifier back into subspace, to save for a more conventional bitlet. He started to rub the back of his broad neck. The actuators felt tight underneath the comparatively thin plating. Grimlock leaned even lower.

“Aw, do you like that, buddy?” Kup was close enough to nuzzle him now. Grimlock almost knocked him over when he nuzzled him back, but Kup braced himself to it, charmed by the younger mech’s open affection.

“Uh huh.”

Kup put an arm around his neck and pulled him closer, cuddling him to his chest while he rubbed him. Grimlock’s optics dimmed, and he started making a sound like a freight train, a happy version of his roar.

“You wanna stay here a while?” He rubbed behind an audial, and the rumble got even louder. Grimlock tilted his head, pressing into the touch. “Wanna chew your toy an’ be my li’l dino-bit?”

“Uh huh.” Grimlock nudged and nuzzled him, starting to get lost in the role. His head was almost the size of Kup’s whole chest, but he just wrapped his arms around him and kept petting. He’d cuddled bigger.

“Pretty baby,” he crooned. “You’re Uncle Kup’s sweet little bit, aren’t ya?”

“Nm hm,” Grimlock agreed around the toy in his mouth. He chewed rhythmically as he snuggled with Kup, his usual aggressive posture exchanged for unselfconscious submission.

Kup felt warm inside when he saw Grimlock’s defenses come down. A bot got an optic for who needed it when they did this long enough, but it was never a sure thing. There was nothing better than seeing a mech start to see the possibilities and open up to his care.

He ruffled the Dinobot’s big head. Grimlock took a harder ruffling than most of his charges. He was almost grinding his knuckles against the plating, and Grimlock was just lapping it up. “How about we get you settled in for a story?”

“Okay,” Grimlock said. "You Uncle Kup tell story, me Grimlock listen.”

Kup purred and kissed his helm all over, rewarding him for using the title. He pulled a blanket off the berth, one of the bigger ones. It was heavy and solid, in a light blue heat-retaining fiber. He draped it over Grimlock’s shoulders and tucked it around him. “There,” he said, pulling it snug around him. “Does that feel good?”

Grimlock nodded with emphasis, his muzzle spreading into a toothy smile around the chew toy.

“Good,” Kup purred to him, ruffling his helm and rubbing his cheek. He looked so cute bundled up against the chill, like a big dinosaurrito. Kup settled into his chair, sighing as he took the weight off his old joints. He patted his lap, clicking for Grimlock to come closer. Grimlock scooted in, pressing his head into Kup’s lap and purring when he was patted and stroked. He still held the ring in his mouth. It seemed he’d gotten used to it quick enough.

“There’s a good bit,” Kup said. “Do you got Bre’r Petrorabbit with ya?”

Grimlock blushed, glancing down for a moment. It was a rare treat to see him acting shy. After a little while, he nodded.

Kup cuddled him closer, snuggling around the big head. “Well, go on an’ take him out, then. I bet he’d like to hear a story too.”

Grimlock took a green petrorabbit doll from subspace. It was about the size of a small human and fit neatly in his arms.

“Evenin’, Mr. Rabbit.” Kup gave the toy a lazy salute before rubbing its little head. “Now,” he said, making himself comfortable in the chair, “what kinda story should I tell you two?”

“Tell exciting story!” Grimlock said, thumping his tail on the floor in anticipation.

“Exciting, huh?” Kup rubbed his chin, running through his extensive memory files for a story to suit the occasion. “I ever tell you ’bout the time I shot an Ick Yak in my pajamas?”

Grimlock shook his head. He was grinning with excitement, showing all his teeth. Kup tugged his head further into his lap, and he scooted forward obediently. “All right, well. First things first. Do you know what pajamas are?”

Grimlock tilted his head, considering for a moment. “They little human clothes. Have teddy bears on them.”

Kup ruffled his head. “Well, they’re not just for humans. Folk like ’em pretty well on Vtevetron.”

“Where that Vtevetron?” Grimlock asked, leaning eagerly into the touch.

“It’s out in the Dalifon cluster, way out in the sticks.” He gestured vaguely in the direction of Dalifon. “It’s a metal jungle planet. Beautiful place, if you don’t mind the wildlife.” He looked at Grimlock, appraising him. He was about the size of some of the rougher wildlife. “You’d like it. Anyway, the bots there’re big into pajamas. Or anyway, they were twelve million years ago. You know how fashion is.”

“Uh huh.” Grimlock was perfectly willing to say he knew how fashion was, although his closest experience to it was the time Carly’s favorite sweater vest got burnt in an explosion, and she replaced it with a vibrantly polychromatic one until Spike made her stop.

Kup stroked Grimlock’s head as his processor drifted back through the memory files. “I’d been there about a lunar rotation, and I’d started seein’ this guy called Mazhlakh. Sweet bot, and bright, too.” He gestured at his shoulders. “Pipes like you wouldn’t believe.”

“Anyway, one day he gives me a box, tells me to open it up. It’s a pair of pajamas. Li’l blue plasmofiber jumpsuit, real soft. Got snaps over all the important bits.” He winked at the tyrannosaurus in his lap, and Grimlock chortled back. His optics were bright with excitement and fixed adoringly on Kup.

“He says he wants to see me in ’em, and to meet him tonight out back of the commissary.” He shook his head, a fond expression on his face. “Nights on Vtevetron were somethin’ else. They had these diode mites that’d fly around, looked like a bunch of living glitter. All the little mechanimals’d make their little sounds at dusk. The cybercats an’ the bolt-bats. _Chk-chk-chk._ Whole planet seemed alive.”

Grimlock’s head lolled in Kup’s lap, his frame relaxed and peaceful. Having something to chew on seemed to give him more patience for scene setting.

“Well, dusk is coming on, so I wanna get cleaned up to meet ’im. The wash racks’re outside at this base, a flat spot cut outta the jungle and a bunch of curtains around it. It’d get too damp having ’em inside. And on a planet that’s half jungle an’ half metal, you gotta worry about the damp. So anyway, I hang up the pajamas on a tree to keep ’em dry, and I get into the wash racks to hose myself off. I’m just lathering up my wheel wells when I hear this _Stomp. Stomp. Stomp._ ” He paused for emphasis. Grimlock looked up at him, hanging on his every word, waiting for the exciting part. “At first I thought it was one of the bigger bots, so I call out an’ say hi. Nothin’ back. I stick my head out the curtain, and sure as I’m sittin’ here, there stands an Ick Yak! Twenty mechanometers tall!” Grimlock’s optics got bigger as he Kup gestured to try and convey the size of the thing. “Breath like a smelting pit, coulda scorched half the base if it wanted. And you know what it had on its back?”

Grimlock shook his head, transfixed by Kup’s story, imagining the monstrous creature. “Nuh uh.”

“My pajamas!” Kup threw his arms up in remembered frustration. “They didn’t even fit.”

Grimlock took the ring from his mouth, more interested in the story than his toy. “What you do then?”

Kup ruffled the top of his head. “Well, I had to get ’em back, didn’t I? I yelled, ‘Hey you, Ick Yak! You give those back!’” He shook his head. “That didn’t work so good. An’ I guess it didn’t like me yellin’ at it, ’cause it let out a plume of fire bigger’n my whole chassis. I have to duck an’ roll to get away from it. So much for gettin’ clean. Then the dirty iridium-muncher goes stompin’ off through the jungle.”

“Him Ick Yak fast?” Grimlock had come partway out of his little blanket-burrito in his excitement. Kup tucked the blanket back around him.

“You bet your claws he was fast, kid. One of his footsteps was the size of this room. I had to transform to tear after him. An’ I send Mazhlakh a message, tell ’im I’m gonna be late, ’cause I can tell this’ll take a while. And then I keep on that Ick Yak like paint on a show car. I know if I lose ’im in the jungle that’s it, an’ I’m not gettin’ a second chance. A breem goes by chasin’ that fragger, then another. And all this time I’m shakin’ my frame off drivin’ over Afijed roots at least half my height ’cause it’s still faster’n running.”

Kup leaned back in his seat. He steepled his hands, remembering the chase. “Now, there’s a trick to chasin’ an Ick Yak, you know that, Grimmy?”

Grimlock looked up at him, optics bright with curiosity.

“Trick is: you don’t wanna catch it.”

Grimlock boggled. “Huh?”

“Well, what’s a bot my size gonna do with a cornered Ick Yak? Get my circuits toasted, that’s what, and not in the fun way. Nah, you gotta keep on ’im, let ’im wear ’imself out. Ick Yaks may be big an’ fast, but they ain’t known for their stamina. So you don’t get close enough to make it turn an’ fight ya, but you don’t get far enough away that it stops running either. I musta rode that thing’s tail five megamiles before it finally starts to slow down. Which is good, ’cause I ain’t feelin’ fresh as a magneto-daisy myself. I’m covered in dirt and Afijed sap and cleanser film from the shower, an’ I’m hot an miserable. But I’ve outlasted that scaly-faced pajama thief, at least.

“We’re deep in the jungle now, branches everywhere, not much space to move around. A li’l pickup truck’s got the advantage over a great big Ick Yak there. So I figure it’s now or never. I give it some extra juice and close the gap. Now, that big cam-jammer’s not too happy to see me in his personal space, an’ I catch a fire blast to the fender. So now I’m _scorched_ an’ hot an’ miserable, but I ain’t gonna give up now. I shoot ’im in his foot, and while he’s hoppin’ around tryin’ to figure out what happened, I make a leap for it, an’ I jump on his back! Ick Yaks _hate_ it when you do that. So it starts shootin’ its flames again, _Fwoosh!_ So I gotta grab it by the neck-plates an’ pull its head up, so it don’t scorch the li’l jacket.” He pantomimed pulling on the giant creature’s neck, arms out in front of him and leaning back as if being bucked and tossed around.

“So I’m clinging to this crazy glitch’s back for dear function. It’s buckin’ around like some kinda turbo-pony, and I’m tryin’ to strip it. This is my first time with a getup like this. I barely know how to undo the little buttons on myself on solid ground, let alone on a giant Ick Yak twenty mechanometers up. I musta tried twenty times to get the collar button undone, an’ the whole time the big scaly glitch is buckin’ like a llamacon at a rodeo. I thought he was gonna tear the buttons off, but that’s Vtevetron for ya. Real craftsmanship out there.”

Grimlock was resting his head in Kup’s lap, optics focused as if he could picture the monster, the struggle, and the little blue pajamas. He was chewing happily on the ring, testing the strength of the material. Kup was pleased to see it holding up. Most metals would have been confetti by that point.

Kup smiled at the rapt attention in his bright optics. He really would follow the story anywhere Kup took it. He couldn’t ask for a better audience. Kup rubbed the top of Grimlock’s head, and he made a snuffling noise of appreciation as he leaned into it. “What happen then?”

“Mm? Oh!” Kup was shaken from the present moment, the sweet little mechling hanging on his every word, and returned to the jungle of Vtevetron. “Well, it wasn’t easy, I’ll tell you that. Ick Yak shook me so hard I was hangin’ on by one hand, wavin’ around like some kinda big green flag.” He sat up in the chair, waving his body around like he was being shaken. “It shook its head an’ I’d snap to one side, then I’d swing as far as I could go an’ I’d snap right back the other way. Finally, I manage to use its own momentum against it. It gives me an almighty shake, an’ when I swing back around, I grab the pajamas, let go of the Ick Yak, an’ hit the ground rollin!

“I burn rubber back to base, back over the roots, back over the mud, _bump-bump-bump_ , ’cause I ain’t hangin’ around to see what that ugly galoot thought of the situation. But it musta cut its losses, ’cause it didn’t come after me. I got back to base in one piece, with the pajamas in hand.”

Grimlock grinned broadly. He always loved stories about winning.

“I high-tail it to behind the commissary, ’cause I’m late enough as it is. No time to get any of the Ick Yak goo off first. Mazhlakh’s standin’ there waitin’, and he’s...” his optics turned distant, and he sighed at the memory. “...gorgeous. He was always gorgeous. Looked like some kinda jungle flower. And me, I’m scorched to the pit an’ back, covered in mud, stinkin’ of monster an’ I can hardly talk above my cooling fans. He’s on me in an astrosecond askin’ what happened an’ holdin’ me to his fuselage.” His face softened, lips turning up in a silly smile. “He had a real nice fuselage.

“He barely believed me when I told him what’d happened. ‘An Ick Yak, Kup? What was it doing in your pajamas?’ But he cleaned off the goo an’ the char an’ patched me up. Patched up the pajamas too, once they’d been cleaned. Real sweet guy. An’ he told me next time, I can get dressed inside.” He chuckled and shook his head, recalling Mazhlakh’s fond incredulity, his gentle concern and his steady hands as he’d patched him.

Grimlock laughed, as deep as a bell. He snuggled closer to Kup, hugging his leg and nuzzling at his chest. “Me Grimlock like that story, Kup.”

Kup hugged his head, rumbling his engine fondly as he held him. “Well thank you, Grimmy. I know you don’t listen to just anyone.”

Grimlock shook his head. “You Kup good story teller.” Grimlock started rumbling in response, loud enough to wake the dead. Kup settled in for a good, long cuddle, resting on the chair’s padding while he petted his head.

“Can’t ask for a better recommendation’n that now, can I?” He kissed the top of Grimlock’s head, on the ridge between his optics. He held him there in his arms, enjoying the heavy feel of his head against his chassis, warm and relaxed and in no hurry to leave. There was something special about having the fire-spitting King of the Dinobots in his lap, meek as a cyberkitten. The mechling was so sweet when he’d decided to trust someone. It gave him a charge in his circuits to hold him like this, to see him act so young, to have a caretaker’s power over him. He could tell that they were going to have a good, long time to explore Grimlock’s younger side. His processor drifted, imagining hand-feeding the big lizard, bathing him and tucking him into his nest, letting his hands wander over him, teaching him how to kiss his caretaker nice...

Grimlock was starting to drift off, comfortable in Kup’s lap and clearly trusting him. Kup smiled to himself. Yeah, they had plenty of time. For now, he just enjoyed having the bit in his arms, purring away like a freight train, like there was no harm in the whole galaxy. He squeezed him closer and leaned back in the chair. When his own processor powered down, his dreams were sweet.


End file.
